NCAA Tournament

I like to think I know a lot about college basketball. Since the football season ended I've watched no less than four hours of college basketball every day. Granted, most of those games have been from the ACC, Big East, Big Ten and SEC conferences - with a splash of late night WCC games. So when the NCAA tournament rolls around I know a a little about half the teams that are playing. Teams like UTEP, Siena, and Morgan State, not so much. Sure, I can look up their rosters to see how tall they are and how experienced the players are but other than that I'm pretty much in the dark. Having spent so much time watching games you'd think I'd do well at picking teams in the NCAA bracket.

It never pans out.

After watching Georgetown go all the way to the final game in the Big East tournament you'd never think they'd lose to Ohio in the first round.

Tennessee should have beaten San Diego State by more than three.

Vanderbuilt losing to Murry State?

Notre Dame on a Big East hot streak only to lose to Old Dominion?

That being said, this is the first year since high school that I didn't fill out a bracket. I didn't even look at a bracket. Sure, I checked the point spreads of all the games to make individual wagers but that's as far as I went. It just pains me to put in all that time and effort filling out a bracket only to see that all my "expert" knowledge goes right down the tubes the first two days of tournament action.

Instead I put my infinitesimal knowledge on a number of wagers.

Notre Damn -2 (L).
Vandrebuilt -3 (L).
Marquette -1 (L).
Morgan St. +17.5 (L).
Clemson -1 (L).

Good track record so far. I did have a couple winners in there.

Xavier pick (W).
Morgan St. under 138 (W).
Texas A&M -3 (W).

The whew/shucks game was Tennessee -3 which I had a little more action on and ended up pushing.

I hope to do better in the second round.

But the thing is, not filling out a bracket has taken some of the fun out of the tournament. I've taken off of work the Thursday and Friday of the opening games the last ten years. I've always had a sheet in front of me with X'sand O's leading up to the final game. This year I don't have one. I'm not that interested in who wins the whole thing. I'd like to see DeMarcus Cousins cry when Kentucky loses to Kansas in the final but other than that I could care less. Cousins has millions waiting for him this summer.

To the rest of you who have filled out brackets I wish the best of luck to you. I'm just looking at 15 days till baseball starts.